A conventional home cooking appliance, such as a slide-in gas range, includes a housing having a cooking compartment, such as a baking oven, convection oven, steam oven, warming drawer, etc., and a cooking surface formed, for example, by cooking grates disposed over gas burners on top of the housing. The appliance must exhaust the flue gases from the cooking compartment to maintain safe temperatures, acceptable combustion, etc. within the cooking compartment. To do this, a conventional home cooking appliance commonly includes a raised or elevated exhaust vent at a rear of the appliance that exhausts flue gases upward from the housing in a vertical direction (i.e., at a 90° angle with respect to with respect to the surface of the cooktop or cooking grates), for example, to try to keep the hot flue gases from blowing on a user of the appliance and also to avoid the flue gases interfering with the operation of the gas burners. Conventional home cooking appliances typically require the rear vent trim to be a certain height above the cooking surface in order to exhaust the hot flue gas from the appliance without interfering with the operation of the burners.
A conventional slide-in range is installed in a cooking area of a home kitchen with a rear wall of the appliance facing a back wall of the kitchen. The appliance typically is disposed between counters with floor cabinets below the counters. The kitchen may include wall cabinets mounted on the back wall of the kitchen either over the cooking surface of the range or over the adjacent floor cabinets, and/or another appliance or component, such as an over-the-range (OTR) microwave oven or an OTR convection microwave oven over the cooking surface. Industry standards and regulations commonly dictate acceptable temperatures of the combustible back wall behind the appliance, acceptable temperatures of cabinets or components over the range or adjacent to the range, as well as acceptable door temperatures for the appliance, during high temperature events, such as during a self-cleaning cycle of the oven while all burners on the cooktop are on a highest heat setting.
Conventional appliances include various structures and techniques designed to manage and dissipate the hot air being exhausted from the appliance while complying with industry standards and regulations. In order to provide enough air flow through the appliance to maintain acceptable surface temperatures and oven door temperatures, and to protect all components, some conventional appliances include costly designs and door construction that increase the air flow through the door and/or include raised vent trims with greater air flow and louder fans. However, these designs can result in increased manufacturing costs and increased fan noise for the user.
For example, a conventional home cooking appliance may attempt to improve compliance with the industry standards and regulations by increasing a height of the rear vent above the cooking surface to exhaust the flue gases upward from the housing without interfering with the operation of the burners or directing the hot air toward the user. Another known manner of improving compliance with the industry standards and regulations is to increase an air flow through the appliance or an airflow exiting the appliance from the cooking compartment in order to improve compliance with the industry standards and regulations. However, increasing the air flow through the appliance or exiting over the appliance not only can disrupt the performance of the burners on the cooktop, but also can increase fan noise for the user.
Yet another known manner of improving compliance with the industry standards and regulations is to manage hot air with dilution flues, which allow cool air to flow into the flue and mix with the flue gases before exiting the flue in order to reduce outlet temperatures and protect the flue outlet and other components from unacceptable heat. However, a dilution flue typically requires a large amount of space in the housing of the appliance, and requires special tooling and expensive components, resulting in increased manufacturing costs.
Additionally, conventional home cooking appliances may require a rear wall of the appliance to be spaced from the combustible back wall by a certain amount of clearance in order to manage and dissipate hot air from the appliance in order to improve compliance with the industry standards and regulations.